At the Roots of Product Placement: The Mere Exposure Effect

Abstract

The present study aims to analyze the effect of product placement on attitude change
and takes into consideration psychological models of the mere exposure effect. A sample
of high school students watched an excerpt from two widely-distributed movies in which
several products were shown by using the technique known as product placement. The
results indicate that students who saw the commercial brand liked the products more
than those who didn’t see it. This effect, in line with the literature on the product
placement effect, seems to be independent from the recognition of the brand in the
movie excerpt. This study also shows that, in the high involvement condition, one
exposure is enough to produce a positive attitude toward the brand.

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Research in the field of advertising has evolved over the last fifty years and has
developed increasingly innovative techniques aimed at producing specific purchasing
behaviors. Often however, the bizarre hearsay surrounding hidden messages – whose
true effects on people’s behavior have not been demonstrated by empirical evidence
– has managed to influence a great deal of advertising related to so-called “subliminal
stimulation” (Balasubramanian, 1994; D’Astous & Chartier, 2000).

Repeated exposure to a product in order to associate a positive affect to it is in
fact the most common approach in advertising. One of the techniques based on this
concept is known as product placement, where brands of cars, accessories, clothes,
drinks, and other products appear clearly in video segments without however giving
the impression of watching a commercial. Brand placement offers advertisers a potentially
successful alternative to traditional advertising because the advertiser’s message
is integrated within the editorial content (Roehm, Roehm, & Boone, 2004). Apparently, the actors in a film are simply using a particular object, and often
the presence of the commercial brand is not even noticed by the spectator. The products
are placed in advantageous, natural, and credible contexts that offer advertisers
an opportunity to add favorable associations to their brands (Karrh, 1998). Companies using this advertising approach exploit the cinema as a promotional showcase,
sharing a portion of the production costs in exchange for adequate visibility of their
products in the film. Oddly, this approach goes back to the beginnings of cinematography.
The Lumière brothers were the first to insert a detergent in one of their films back
in 1895. At first, this approach developed greatly with the proliferation of cinema,
then more so with television. Among the most common examples are the films featuring
Agent 007, which over the years have become ever more crowded with watches, automobiles,
and hi-tech products, that cast their image alongside that of James Bond.

Despite the frequent use of product placement, there are few scientific studies which
prove they are indeed effective. Even marketing studies have not yet demonstrated
clearly that mere product placement can guarantee sales, nor that it determines a
more positive attitude towards the product. The most common measure of product placement
effectiveness has been consumer memory, especially in regard to brand attitude, image
and choice, but the evidence is inconclusive (Balasubramanian, Karrh, & Parwardhan, 2006; Law & Braun, 2000; Matthes, Schemer, & Wirth, 2007). Studies on the effect of product placement have employed explicit and implicit
memory tests. In explicit (or direct) tests, participants’ memory of recently viewed
episodes (Law & Braun, 2000) is tested to evaluate the impact of product placement and, more specifically, free
recall (asking them to recall brands seen in the film) (D’Astous & Chartier, 2000; Gupta & Lord, 1998), aided recall (asking them to recall a given product category cue) (Auty & Lewis, 2004; Karrh, 1994; van Reijmersdal, Neijens, & Smit, 2007) and recognition (asking them to judge whether they remember seeing a brand in the
film) (Babin & Carder, 1996; Gupta & Lord, 1998; Law & Braun, 2000). In implicit tests participants are not asked to remember events, but simply to
perform some task. Here memory is measured as an increase in performance (relative
to an appropriate baseline), such as greater accuracy in identifying items seen recently
compared to new items, or by a decrease in the amount of time necessary to identify
recently seen items (for an extensive review on implicit memory testing techniques,
see Schacter, 1987).

Although there have been many studies on brand placement, the effects of brand image
on attitudes has remained largely unexplored. This is surprising, because image change
is often considered one of the benefits of brand placement for advertisers (DeLorme & Reid, 1999; Karrh, 1998). van Reijmersdal, Neijens, & Smit (2007) found that the integration of a brand into the editorial content of a program had
a significant effect on brand image.

One of the most important variables impacting the effects of persuasive messages is
exposure (Krugman, 1972; Zajonc, 1968, 2001). Because brand placement is a kind of persuasive message, repetition is likely to
influence placement effects as well. The change in brand image might reflect an overall
positive change in brand evaluation regardless of the context in which the brand appeared
(van Reijmersdal, Neijens, & Smit, 2007).

The vast literature on the theory of the mere exposure effect shows that repeated
exposure to an object leads to an increased positive affect or a reduced negative
affect toward that object (Harmon-Jones & Allen, 2001; Zajonc, 1968, 2001). These effects cannot be explained by memory and have even proved to be more pronounced
under subliminal conditions than when subjects are aware of the repeated exposure
(Zajonc, 2001).

Two different hypotheses have been formulated to explain these results, and they are
still being evaluated. According to the first hypothesis, the nonconscious mere exposure
effect indicates the primacy of emotional processes over cognitive ones, in the sense
that the former occur more rapidly than the latter and are independent from them (Arcuri, Castelli, Boca, Lorenzi-Cioldi, & Dafflon, 2001; Murphy & Zajonc, 1993; Zajonc 1980, 1984). The alternative hypothesis maintains that the effect of repeated exposition is
linked to the “perceptual fluency” of implicit memory, in the sense that the relative
ease of recall of information can be heuristic in making affect judgments (Bornstein & D’Agostino, 1992; Seamon et al., 1983, 1995).

Let us attempt to analyze in detail these different explanatory hypotheses. According
to Zajonc (1980), the nonconscious mere exposure is produced on the basis of a diverse elaboration
of emotional and cognitive processes and, in particular, because emotional reactions
precede cognitive reactions. More specifically, affect judgments are crude thoughts;
they are generic entities which do not permit the recognition of stimuli, only their
evaluation. On the contrary, cognitive processes are crucial to the analysis of the
stimulus’ components, and they make possible the differentiation and recognition of
the stimulus itself. Neuro-anatomical and neuro-physiological studies (LeDoux, 1996; Zola-Morgan, Squire, Alvarez-Royo, & Clower, 1991) have confirmed that cognitive and emotional aspects, though they both participate
in the determination of behavior, are in reality quite different, both on a psychological
and on a neurological level. Zola-Morgan et al. (1991), for example, in studies on primates, observed that lesions of the amygdala (an organ
supervising emotional stimulation) influence affect, but do not alter cognitive aspects,
while a lesion of the hippocampus (an organ fundamental to memory processes) will
alter cognitive functions while leaving emotional functions undisturbed. Other studies
have shown that emotional processes can be induced without triggering awareness. Elliott and Dolan (1998) used PET (positron emission tomography) measures to show that the acquisition of
preferences is a function of exposure to repeated subliminal stimuli and they evidenced
certain neuroanatomical correspondences. In particular, the authors found that recognition
judgments were localized in the frontopolar cortex and the parietal areas, whereas
preference reactions showed right lateral frontal activation. The hypothesis that
recognition and preference reside in different areas supports the hypothesis that
emotional and cognitive systems act independently, at least in the early phases of
elaboration of stimuli. Given the independence of the two systems, it is possible
to explain why the mere exposure effect is strong and clear when it occurs subliminally,
rather than when subjects are aware. If the process was merely cognitive, different
individuals would tend to attribute different qualities to the same content, and intra-participant
variability would increase. On the contrary, when the contribution of cognitive processes
is reduced, emotional influences tend to dominate behavior, producing a more uniform
set of reactions (Zajonc, 2001).

In an alternative explanatory hypothesis, the mere exposure effect it is described
as an expression of recognition memory based on perceptual fluency (Bornstein & D’Agostino, 1992; Schacter, 1987; Schacter, Cooper, & Delaney, 1990; Squire, 1992). Perceptual fluency can be considered the ease with which stimuli are re-codified
after repeated codifications have already taken place (Jacoby & Dallas, 1981), while recognition memory is considered a non-intentional and non-aware process
of recalling previously acquired information. Several researchers have suggested that
familiarity with the stimuli plays an important role in preference judgments (Bornstein & D’Agostino, 1992; Klinger & Greenwald, 1994; Seamon et al., 1983). For example, Seamon et al. (1983) have argued that the nonconscious mere exposure effect can be explained by Mandler’s
(Mandler, Nakamura, & Van Zandt, 1987) two process recognition model, which assumed that forced choice judgments are based
on either stimulus familiarity or a memory search. Having to choose between target
and distractor stimuli in a preference task, participants preferred elements to which
they had been exposed previously because they were familiar with the way to process
that information. Seamon et al. (1995, 1997) hypothesized that this ease of elaboration, or difference in the perceptual fluency
of target and distractor, was essentially why the target stimulus was chosen. And
in the same perspective, when familiarity judgments are made without the intervention
of memory, participants prefer stimuli to which they have been previously exposed,
even though they do not recognize them. Consistently, the authors found that preferential
affect tests also measure recognition memory. A meta-analysis of exposure and affect
(Bornstein, 1989) concludes that subliminal stimuli may be processed affectively without any concomitant
cognitive processing.

Although not strictly subliminal, product placements may not be consciously encoded
even by participants who are capable of doing so, but certainly the brand is processed
affectively, since this reaction is spontaneous and does not require the allocation
of attentional resources.

Few studies have focused on the effects of the frequency of exposure to brand placements
and brand image. Van Reijmersdal, Neijens, and Smit (2007), for example, studied the effects of repeated exposure to brand placement on brand
image and found that exposure frequency is an important variable that affects brand
image. In their survey, two or more exposures were needed to produce an effect on
brand image. Auty and Lewis (2004) found that reminding subjects of prior exposures had an effect on choice-related
behavior: children who saw a film excerpt in which the brand Pepsi-Cola was present
were more likely to then choose Pepsi instead of Coke. Ferraro, Bettman, and Chartrand (2009) demonstrated that individuals are exposed to brands during their daily encounters
with other consumers, and this may influence their choice of products. Even if results
like these seem to bring irrefutable proof of the effect of product placement, they
may be due to processes that leave the attitude toward the brand untouched.

Closer to the aim of the present study are the results of Matthes, Schemer, and Wirth (2007), who found that after repeated brand exposures, participants with a high level of
involvement and low persuasion knowledge (Russell, 2002) develop a positive attitude toward the brand.

The aim of the present experiment was to investigate if a single exposure to a product
in a high involvement condition was able to affect attitudes toward a brand. The studies
heretofore conducted on product placement and attitude change use repeated exposures
to private brands to change brand image (Matthes, Schemer, & Wirth, 2007; van Reijmersdal, Neijens, & Smit, 2007). To test this hypothesis, researchers used natural stimuli. Participants watched
20 minute excerpts of popular films in which various private brands were visible,
thus reproducing in a controlled situation what commonly happens in film theaters.

Specifically, we will analyze the nonconscious mere exposure effect with the goal
of replicating the effect of product placement on brand attitude with a single exposition,
thus demonstrating at the same time that exposure awareness is totally absent.

The effect of product placement is evaluated for all the brands that appear in the
film excerpts.

Since so many commercials are directed at young people and since extremely popular
films, especially, are watched mostly by teenagers, they represent the best sample
group for testing our hypothesis.

78 high school teenagers (40 males and 38 females) with ages 14 to 16 (M = 15.03, DS = 1.76) participated in this study. They were divided into two independent groups
and randomly assigned to one of two experimental conditions, each group functioning
as control for the other.

After assembling in a film theater, having been told they would participate in a study
of the language of young people, each of the two groups were shown a film made up
of three film excerpts lasting 15-20 minutes each and designed to be particularly
appealing to young people.

Two of the three excerpts had a masking function and no commercial brands were visible
in them, while one was the target excerpt containing product placement. The target
segment was always shown in the central position of the sequence. The first group
viewed a portion of film in which Adidas, UMM, Cremeria, Volkswagen and Nike brands
were present. The second group viewed a portion of film in which Guru, Ray Ban, Coke,
TIM and Samsung brands were present. Brand exposure lasted from about one to about
two minutes (at times brand exposures partially overlapped each other).

The participants’ involvement was increased by telling them that they would answer
a few questions about the content of certain scenes after viewing the film. The five
participants who gave the most correct answers would be awarded two free tickets for
watching a recently released film at the same film theater.

To verify that the brands had indeed been noticed during the viewing of the film,
each of the two groups completed a questionnaire containing questions about the non-target
segments they had seen and other questions designed to investigate how the presence
of brands in the target film was perceived. In particular, since each group was the
control group for the other, subjects were asked to indicate whether all 10 brands
were present in the target film, though only 5 were present in the target film for
one group, and 5 in the other.

Subjects were then asked how well they liked each of the 10 brands, using a 7-point
Likert scale ranging from “I like it very much” to “I don’t like it at all”.

First we analyzed the level of affect for each of the brands presented as a function
of exposure to that brand. The results, illustrated in Figure 1, show significant differences between the two conditions (exposure to brand vs. non-exposure
to brand) for all brands (15.86 < Fs < 64.49; p < .01). It can be seen that subjects who were exposed to commercial brands clearly
preferred those brands to others, regardless of the type of product.

Figure 1

Level of affect.

In subsequent analyses we explored whether this greater preference was linked to an
aware recognition of the brand in the film excerpt. Introducing the recognition of
the brand as a variable in our analysis, we expected that if greater preference was
linked to recognition, then we would find a significant interaction between exposition
and preference. Vice-versa, lack of interaction would signify that the increase in
preference after exposure does not depend on an aware recognition of that brand.

The results (shown in Table 1) clearly illustrate that in none of the ten statistical tests was there any indication
that the recognition of a brand had an effect on preference for that brand.

Table 1

Effect of Exposure and Recognition of Brand

F

Sig.

ADIDAS

Exposure brand

15.112

0.001

Recognition brand

0.273

0.662

Exposure x Recognition

1.098

0.298

UMM

Exposure brand

39.307

0.000

Recognition brand

2.983

0.088

Exposure x Recognition

0.007

0.935

TIM

Exposure brand

24.815

0.000

Recognition brand

3.825

0.054

Exposure x Recognition

3.130

0.081

SAMSUNG

Exposure brand

17.167

0.000

Recognition brand

0.108

0.743

Exposure x Recognition

0.927

0.339

CREMERIA

Exposure brand

11.447

0.001

Recognition brand

0.254

0.876

Exposure x Recognition

0.190

0.664

RAY-BAN

Exposure brand

12.364

0.001

Recognition brand

0.108

0.796

Exposure x Recognition

0.179

0.616

NIKE

Exposure brand

20.880

0.000

Recognition brand

0.113

0.737

Exposure x Recognition

0.008

0.927

GURU

Exposure brand

22.354

0.000

Recognition brand

0.552

0.460

Exposure x Recognition

0.162

0.680

WV

Exposure brand

26.242

0.000

Recognition brand

0.275

0.602

Exposure x Recognition

0.347

0.558

COKE

Exposure brand

6.600

0.012

Recognition brand

0.075

0.786

Exposure x Recognition

0.589

0.445

Thus an extremely interesting aspect emerges – the mere placement of a brand in a
film tends to generate a positive attitude in an immediate post-test designed to evaluate
how well subjects like the product, regardless of whether the product is recognized
or not.

The mere exposure to the message in a context like this seems to lead to a positive
attitude towards the brand.

The pervasiveness of the mere exposure phenomenon, as stated above, has been well-documented
in over fifty years of research, rendering it one of the most stable and verified
phenomena in all of social psychology. Even though our understanding of the mere exposure
effect is incomplete, the effect is so strong that it is studied quite frequently,
even outside the sphere of psychological research, and is often considered a form
of subliminal stimulation. Things do not change in the case of product placement,
given that these effects are complementary: mere exposure is strictly connected with
psychology and product placement with marketing.

Results of this study showed that in the high involvement condition, one exposure
is enough to produce a positive attitude toward the brand. Mere exposure theory suggests,
in fact, that the limited processing that occurs with a single product placement exposure
is enough to produce a feeling of familiarity that is later mistaken as a preference
for the stimulus (Janiszewski, 1993; Zajonc, 1980).

In the case of brand placement, when high involvement gives rise to high levels of
attention toward the film, even a short exposition time and a reduced number of repetitions
are enough to produce an effect on brand image.

The results of this study confirm yet again the heuristic capacity of this construct
in advertising, especially in regard to product placement, which continues to proliferate
in cinema and TV production. These results in fact explain the extensive use of product
placement in the last decades.

Results confirm that teenagers act like adults in relation to product placement and
mere exposure effect. Though this sample has many characteristics and variables that
differ from adult samples, (Pace & Zappulla, 2009, 2011), it is nevertheless coherent with adult samples as far as the effects of exposure
to commercial brands are concerned.

As for the limitations of this study, let us mention first those related to the use
of self-reported attitude measures unaccompanied by choice behavior assessment. The
focus of the present experiment was on attitude change, but certainly a better understanding
of the phenomenon will require future investigation of both attitude and behavior
resulting from exposure to commercial brands.

Another critical issue is the delay between brand exposition and attitude assessment.
The aim of product placement is that of changing consumer’s attitude and behavior
for a relatively long period, certainly a period long enough to increase the likelihood
of purchasing the advertised product. The present research evidences the effect of
product placement immediately after the exposition to commercial brands. A delayed
post-test is needed to test whether the expectations of the manufacturers with regard
to product placement were met.

Product placement has often been incorrectly assimilated to subliminal advertising,
which is a field of enquiry that is still nebulous and void of documented certainties,
where myths and legends often obfuscate available empirical evidence. The observation
of product placement in a controlled environment, the documentation of its persuasive
capacity, and its placement within the framework of a detailed psychological model
such as the mere exposure effect, can increase our understanding of the phenomenon
and lay the grounds for further and more complete investigations.

1 In reality the first data gathered concerned the evaluation, in the laboratory,
of sets of stimuli for which no preceding attitude existed, such as geometric figures
or Chinese ideograms. Later, more ecologically valid research concentrated on more
familiar and common attitude objects. It was also shown that, under these conditions,
the mere exposure effect was not produced by stimuli when there were clear pre-existing
negative attitudes (Bornstein, 1989).

D’Astous, A., & Chartier, F. (2000). A study of factors affecting consumer evaluations
and memory of product placements in movies. Journal of Current Issues and Research in Advertising, 22, 31-40. doi:10.1080/10641734.2000.10505106

Russell, C. A. (2002). Investigating the effectiveness of product placements in television
shows: The role of modality and plot connection congruence on brand memory and attitude.
Journal of Consumer Research, 29, 306-318. doi:10.1086/344432